Airport drop-off charges must be paired with better public transport

The rising cost of dropping someone off at Britain’s airports has drawn predictable grumbles from travellers and no shortage of headlines. The increased fees support legitimate goals, including reducing curbside congestion, promoting more sustainable travel and encouraging greater use of public transport, but charges alone are unlikely to deliver the en masse behaviour change airports want.

 

If airports want passengers to leave their cars at home, the “stick” of higher drop-off charges needs a more appetising “carrot” that makes the alternative much easier to stomach.

 

It’s easy to see why the increases have frustrated passengers. Sixteen of the UK’s 20 busiest airports have raised their drop-off charges since last summer, bringing the average to £7, up £1.70. The last holdout among the top 20, London City, started charging in January and, as if to make up for lost time, set its rate at a nation-leading £1.60 per minute. Gatwick and Stansted charge £10. 

 

Drivers see these fees as a hefty tax on a ninety-second “kiss and fly” ritual. Given that none of the EU’s 10 busiest airports charge for drop-off at all, it can also feel arbitrary. Airports have made efforts to explain the broader goals behind the charges, but passengers have little visibility into how the revenue is used to support those goals.

 

Targets set by government

 

The policy comes from the Department for Transport (DfT); its June 2026 Strategic Vision for Transport to an Expanded Heathrow Airport lists drop-off charges as one of several measures intended to manage demand, alongside parking fees and emissions-based access charges. The policy statement requires any promoter to reach a public transport mode share of at least 50% once terminal capacity passes 116 million passengers, and 55% at 130 million. 

 

Heathrow reaches 42% today – one of the highest figures for any UK airport – against its own target of 45% this year. More than 61 million passengers reached the airport by surface modes in 2024, and expansion would add another 65 million journeys a year.

 

The “kiss and fly” fee does have a defensible purpose and a clear government policy behind it. But is it really working? All 20 of the busiest airports now charge for drop-off, the average has climbed by a third in 12 months and Heathrow still sits three points below the mode share target it set for this year. 

 

The combination of unpopular higher drop-off fees and welcome rail improvements at the terminal isn’t enough to get travellers out of their cars. The missing incentive needs to address what passengers are really weighing up when they decide how to get to the airport.

 

Luggage is key factor

 

The choice of how to get to the airport happens much earlier than airports might think, in the bedroom or at a kitchen table, as a traveller weighs the pile of luggage by the front door against a rail journey with two transfers and decides to book a car. The deciding factor has very little to do with how impressive the new railway station is.

 

Our own research found that four in five private-car users cite luggage as the main reason they won’t use public transport to get to the airport. Anyone who has tried it knows the pain of squeezing a case through a ticket barrier, hauling it upstairs at an interchange and stashing it at their feet on a busy carriage. 

 

Luggage also pushes passengers into a taxi or private-hire car instead of a transfer minibus or coach. The DfT’s own list of bus improvements includes luggage space, which suggests the department has seen the same barrier.

 

Give travellers another way to handle their bags, and the calculation changes. Over the past 12 months, 52% of travellers using a baggage collection service arrived at the airport by public transport, with 85% of those saying the service was the reason they switched. These are drivers who find public transport workable once their baggage stops being the blocker. Not insignificantly, that 52% already clears the threshold the DfT sets for a 116 million-passenger Heathrow. 

 

Switzerland has run this model for years. SBB, the national rail operator, allows travellers to book the flight, the train and baggage collection from the originating station to the airport in one place, with the boarding pass acting as a single reference. Discounts are offered when travellers confirm they will use public transport to reach the airport, so the train becomes the cheaper and lighter option. Japan’s well-established Yamato luggage forwarding and delivery service serves a similar function, allowing travellers to ship larger bags ahead while they use public transport. 

 

Pairing the stick with a carrot

 

To be clear, none of this argues for eliminating drop-off charges. Taxis and private-hire vehicles will keep serving travellers who need them, something the DfT recognises by requiring accessibility exemptions within any charging scheme. A door-to-flight (or flight-to-door or door-to-door) baggage service is one answer. Others include park-and-ride-style drop-off points with free transport with luggage to the terminal, particularly for those travelling from areas poorly served by public transport, regulatory changes to enable pooled private-car and bus journeys, better luggage space on coaches and integrated rail-to-air ticketing.

 

Airports should also ring-fence the drop-off revenue and report on how it’s used, so passengers can see the fee funding alternatives instead of a balance sheet. Put a share of it into services that take luggage out of the journey, and price those services so the greener route costs less. 

 

Charges on their own will continue generating anger and work against the goal of encouraging travellers to use more sustainable transportation modes. Without a better incentive, they have no compelling reason to ever leave the car at home.

 

Paired, however, with something that solves the luggage barrier problem, drop-off charges can stop earning the ill will of the British travelling public and instead start delivering the behaviour change they were designed to produce in the first place.